With the launch of the Xbox Series X, it's been discovered that somehow, there is one game that runs worse on the Series X than it does on current-gen consoles. Perhaps unsurprisingly, that game is Mighty Number 9, a game with an already troubled history, which has gone down as one of Kickstarter's most infamous failures.
In 2013, a Kickstarter was made for what would be the spiritual successor to Mega Man. The series was seemingly in stagnation at the time, with little hope of a new title arriving any time soon. That is, until Mega Man producer Keiji Inafune revealed his spiritual successor to the blue bomber: Mighty Number 9. The Kickstarter campaign was an immediate success, but over time, the game kept receiving delay after delay. When it was finally released in 2016, the game was majorly criticized for multiple factors, including presentation and gameplay. Despite being hyped up as what would be a form of return for the Mega Man style gameplay, Mighty Number 9 went down as a failure for how low quality the final product was despite being funded by $4 million dollars on Kickstarter. It wasn't until Mega Man 11's release that the blue bomber made an official comeback.
As if Mighty Number 9's reputation wasn't bad enough, somehow the launch of the Xbox Series X has made it even worse. During a Series X launch livestream, GigaBoots' session of Mighty Number 9 dropped the frame rate to 0 FPS. Not only that, the game also caused his capture card to crash two times in the span of a minute, showing that not even the all powerful Series X can handle the scale of just how badly Mighty Number 9 holds itself together.
Meanwhile, a big game like Fortnite is able to reach 60 FPS on the Series X. Fortnite is constantly receiving updates that give it additional content to add to the already big battle royale game. A game like that reaching 60 FPS on what is now a new gen console is very impressive, arguably the minimum to some with how powerful the Series X is.
So the fact that Mighty Number 9, a four-year-old game that has nowhere as much content as Fortnite, is struggling to be even playable on this new gen console is just sad. It seems like the legacy of Mighty Number 9 will never be able to live down its infamy. Even though more powerful games will make their way onto the Xbox Series X, Mighty Number 9 continues to remain a landmark of what can happen when an ambitious Kickstarter project goes all wrong.
Source: GigaBoots